Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume
XXXI, South and Central America; Mexico

199. Telephone Conversation Among the Under Secretary of State
(Ball), the Assistant
Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs (Mann), and President
Johnson1

March 31,
1964, 3:38 p.m.

President: Hello?

Ball: Hello? Oh, Mr. President,
this is George Ball.

President: Yes, George.

Ball: Tom Mann is on with me.

President: Hi, Tom.

Mann: Hi.

Ball: A quick run-down of the
situation in Brazil. We had a meeting this morning with Bob McNamara and
Max Taylor and General O’Meara,
who’s come up overnight. And we decided, on the basis of the information
that had come in this morning, to go ahead and start a naval task force
out but with no commitment so that it will be steaming down in that
direction. It couldn’t get into the area before April 10th and in the
meantime we can watch the developments and see whether it should go on
or not. But it could be done in a way that doesn’t create any kind of
public stir. The second thing is: I’ve located some navy tankers in
Aruba, and the big thing that they’re going to need if they have a
successful revolt down there, at some point probably, is some gasoline,
both for motor vehicles and for the aviation. The tankers are going to
be loaded, but again they can’t be down there till around April the 8th
to the 13th. But this is a precautionary move that we’re taking. Third
is: they’re getting together a shipment of ammunition, but this will
have to wait before we start moving it because it will probably have to
be moved by plane and that can only be done after the situation is
clarified and we would, clearly decide to make a commitment in the
situation. Now, what is actually happening on the field is very
confused. We’ve just had a teletype conversation [Page 437]with Linc
Gordon in Rio.2 It seems clear
that the state just north of Rio, which is Minas Gerais, is in revolt.
Both the army and the civilian authorities of the state seem to be
acting together and the army has apparently moved in and authorities
blocked the road from Rio so that the First Army in Rio couldn’t move up
and stop the revolt. We’re waiting for some clarification of the
situation in Sao Paulo, which is the key to the matter. There has
apparently been no movement in Sao Paulo but there is some expected at
almost any moment and we should know within the next few hours what’s
happening. The hope there would be that the Second Army would move and
block the road from Rio down and isolate Rio. And in the meantime they
have drafted an impeachment, in Congressional circles, of Goulart, but there has been no action
taken on it. But they’ve listed all the offenses against the
constitution which they allege. And there is a lot of bickering around
to see what could be done presumably in the way of forming some kind of
a rump civilian government which would have a claim to legitimacy. The
anti-Goulart
government—governors are apparently going to meet Wednesday3 and, on the basis of the
information that Gordon has,
there is a significant number of the governors who are prepared to move
against Goulart, about 9 of them
altogether, which is a very impressive number.

President: How many do they have?

Ball: The total number of states
there is about, how many altogether? Nineteen.

President: Twenty?

Ball: No, 21 they tell me, but
these are the big ones, these are the important states. Now, we have
instructed Gordon not to make any
more contact with the Brazilians until we see how the situation
develops. I think there has to be some more movement in Sao Paulo to
make sure that this thing is going to move, since we don’t want to get
ourselves committed before we know how the thing is going to come out.
He feels that on the basis of the momentum that’s been started so far
that it can wait for 12 hours before anything has to be, or overnight,
before we have to take any decision on whether we should or shouldn’t
move. And I think that we can see the developments and then make a
judgment on it. I gather you’re planning on coming back [unintelligible]
tonight.

Gordon’s outfit, or McCone’s, or you all’s, or McNamara’s, and we just can’t take
this one, and I’d get right on top of it, and stick my neck out a
little.

Ball: Right.

Mann: Well, we’re doing that.

Ball: Well, this is just our own
feeling about it, and we’ve gotten this well organized I think now, I
wanted you to know—5

President: All right. [Omitted here is a short discussion of Panama.]

Source: Johnson Library,
Recordings and Transcripts, Recording of telephone conversation
among President Johnson, Ball and Mann, Tape F64.21, Side B, PNO 3.
No classification marking. Ball and Mann
were in Washington; the President was in Texas. This transcript was
prepared in the Office of the Historian specifically for this
volume. Before telephoning the President, Ball called Rusk: “B said he and Mann were thinking of calling the
President and wondered if the Sec had. Sec had not. Sec asked if
there was anything new after the call to Rio. B said not much; it is
quite fluid, indefinite; Minas seems to be in revolt. Sec asked if
Linc were playing it carefully. B mentioned the cable that went
out.” (March 31, 3:31 p.m., National Archives and Records
Administration, RG 59, Rusk
Files: Lot 72 D 192, Telephone Calls 3/20/64–4/9/64) Ball’s account of both
conversations is in the Johnson Library, Papers of George W. Ball, Brazil,
3/30/64–4/21/66.↩

The text of
the teletype conversation (2:30 p.m.) is ibid., National Security
File, Country File, Brazil, Vol. II, 3/64.↩

In a telephone
conversation at 4 p.m., Ball
briefed McNamara on the
situation in Brazil. The two men agreed that “nothing further could
be gained at this time so the 5:00 meeting scheduled for today was
canceled.” (Johnson Library, Papers of George W. Ball, Brazil, 3/30/64–4/21/66) Rusk held a meeting on Brazil at 5
p.m. (National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, U. Alexis Johnson Files: Lot 90 D
408, Date Books, 1964) No substantive record of the meeting has been
found.↩

Bundy called Ball at 6:40 p.m. to explain that
“the President would prefer to be brought up to date on the Brazil
situation in the morning unless there was some reason for a meeting
tonight.” (Johnson Library, Papers of George W. Ball, Brazil, 3/30/64–4/21/66) In a March
31 memorandum to the President, Bundy and Dungan reported that they would be kept informed by
the Situation Room and would notify the President of any
developments. (Ibid., National Security File, Memos to the
President, McGeorge Bundy,
Vol. I)↩